I’ve Gotta Have It

Mama and Daddy

Grandma and Aunties

Anyone not wishing to know me most intimately, you have been warned. I came here to introduce myself and tell you my name. If you do not wish to know my truest form then from before to here you have been warned.

I. Am. Nola.

I am Zora.

I am cocoa brown skinned exceptionalism, with the sweetest nectar that once tasted will never escape your memory. On your deathbed you could recall the flavor of my glory. I am that unforgettable.

I watched in amazement as Lee—creator and because all the world loves a double entendre the only other half with whom I had created life. The access he has to story telling abilities is genius. Bespoke bedtime lullabies of art and love and pain and brokenness turned into beauty. Spike that is.

I tossed helplessly in the ebb and flow of her story as if It were not my own, because it was so eerily my own. What kind of a lady...I cut my eyes to sever the sentence.

I had a loving bed of my own. One that I welcomed over thirty lovers into. Men. One woman. One pair. Several only once. Only four transcended to true spiritual energy xchange. The rest were simply samples. Pistachio ice cream you cannot fathom a pint of but desperately want to...taste. In they came with a need to wear a wreath of roses when I was no more an adversary than Ferdinand. I could not be conquered. Even the one who tried hardest failed. Jessica Jamese was not there and when Jessica Jamese returned, Jessica Jamese said I AM DONE with the power of Zeus and Osun and that time, he obeyed.

I had sex because I loved the thrill. The body of a black man was my favorite amusement park of all. There i learned the nuances and intricacies of myself. My lovers gave me intimate perspective on the most primal and arguably purest version of me. The me that i chased with every high and every glass of cheap red wine. When I ground my hips against theirs I learned the power of seduction. Make music out of me, fuck me to tears run down my cheeks out of sheer disbelief that something so easy could be so good. I dig my nails into his chest and cry out in ecstasy as the mere experience of me brings him to his most vulnerable. I loved sex because there was no pretense in the bedroom you could not escape your truest desires and therefore your truest self, and perhaps at one point i was addicted to the truth found chasing orgasms.

I take a pull of my glass blunt packed tightly with a bit of my own truth serum. I sat erectly in front of a room with Alice Walker, Gabrielle Union Wade, Toni Morrison and Solange; Each at my flank assuring me that my time was now.

The hum in the room grew low as the audience bottled their emotions in response to full-frontal spiritual nudity. Was this questionably young writer daring to disguise overshare and provocateur as enchantment?

tight shot.

Zoom in.

Focus on the eyes. Let the eyes tell the story. Let her dark brown pools tell the tales of her triumph. I wanted to be free of my secrets. I wanted to be seen but never had i expected this level of detail. I stared at the self portrait wrapped in a 10 episode series. It’s appetizer, a book that called for Wine—the balm that makes pain tolerable.

I stared intently at Gabrielle Union now Wade. I searched for Nikki in her but i could not see. Or i had not noticed her before and her existence was so irrevocable It was also inextricable from her other parts? Instincively my eyes wonder to her dimples. I asked the Gab that lives in my head, the coolest older sister imaginable, what made her smile the most? We both laughed when whatever-it-was caused a grin a mile-wide across her face. She might play characters, but she wasn’t pretending. She wasnt hiding. Her story was out there, this sister who had made me feel valid and intentional my whole life just by existing. Now she lived with the volume turned louder, causing herself to be undeniable and unintentionally she called my ass to the carpet: so what you gone do now?

Walking across the crown of my bed, I light candles and inscence to curate the mood. Sade on vinyl and i was a walking cliche as i threw my dress onto the door and sat naked in my floor smoking weed and listening to her song with my whole body. Sketching with fifty broken pieces of charcoal in an over full art book; this was how I thought. Creation is my cognition, did you understand that?

I needed that, you know ? Could i ever do that with you?

I have a three-headed monster. One whose sex is so good It moves me to tears, and takes me to the most tender parts of myself. He sees me with such clarity, it makes me want to run and hide. But the uniqueness of our dynamic, colored and stained in so much honesty, would anybody ever be as clear about me as you?

The other a love so magnetic it has spanned time, logic and likely utility. Still, after less than seven days I craved him like trees crave sunlight. Do you miss me? I would ask, cautiously optimistic at the chance of a response. Yes. He said. Simply and curtly. And my heart leapt. He misses me. But he would never commit to me. He was too afraid to surrender himself, as was I. Perhaps there was too much scar tissue even for a surgeon.

The third and least complicated was perhaps the most desirable if I described him and us outloud in words you could uunderstand and recognize. The place where we sounded like a cacaphony of wreckage was energetically, and that was my first language. For that reason, Mister Number Three was merely artistic license. My proof that I was unbound and able to do, on a whim, what most would never do in a lifetime.

And then there was her. My soft spot. I danced between wanting to love her and wanting to mother her. Nurture her. Pour my light into her until she returned to her glory. I wish i could make her see that right now is winter, and that though the branches are barren the tree is not dead. She was sanctuary when i needed It most. She was not an experiment, she was not a phase, she was not collateral damage or a bandaid meant to heal my problems with men. She was the first time i saw love and walked towards it without trepidation.

I told you i was Nola.

I am Nova.

I am Gabrielle.

I am Peaches and Saphronia.

I am Jessica Jamese, do you know what that means now when i say it?

I am a spirit that cannot and will not be bound by the judgments of others or myself. I am a movement of love and light and authenticity so pure people will try to mine it. Some already have. However, my light is untouchable and unextinguishable. I am a lover in the truest sense of the word. I am an artist who would rather die than conform or consent to a life less than the one I am capable of living. I am quiet grandeur. A million dollar sofa you can put your feet on and find rest. I am painting my self portrait with my words and over and over again with every story i tell i remind you that Jessica Jamese, I was am Here.